Wimal Weerawansa’s political presence

Wimal Weerawansa is under arrest. The Financial Crimes Investigations Division (FCID) holds that Wimal abused privileges, especially with respect to the use of vehicles.  He is also charged with outright corruption and nepotism regarding the distribution of houses constructed by the government while he was the Minister of Construction, Engineering Services, Housing and Common Amenities in the previous government.  The National Freedom Front (NFF) which Wimal heads, contends he is innocent.  The jury is still out on the legality of the FCID, but this notwithstanding the matter is now in court.  Court will decide.  

Wimal was arrested even as his party was getting ready to hold its convention.  Perhaps the arrest was timed well, politically, the party alleges.  Wimal, after all, is the voice, the personality and all but the party.  One notes that such machinations are not uncommon in Sri Lanka and that the yahapalanists have amply demonstrated that they too are (happy) creatures of a pernicious political culture that has hardly suffered a dent since January 8, 2015.  

The man first entered the political imagination of the country as a journalist.  He was then Wimalasiri Gamlath, writing to ‘Lakdiva’ which evolved into the key media platform of the then proscribed JVP.  He was one of several pro-JVP writers who left that newspaper and launched ‘Hiru’.  It was his lines, in print and those thundered from political platforms, that wide-eyed young people, especially from the universities, lapped up and later mouthed to would-be followers.  

I remember the first time I heard him speak.  This was in 1994, shortly before the General Election.   I was, along with a few others, selling the monthly newspaper put out by a group called ‘Janatha Mithuro’.  We were selling ‘Asipatha’ at the Goodshed bus stand.  Wimal, at the same time, was speaking at a rally at Bogambara.  

While the JVP activists had been extremely silent in the aftermath of the 1988-89 bheeshanaya, it was those involved with the Janatha Mithuro and the Jathika Chinthanaya who talked politics in the universities.  It might even be said that these elements paved the way for the JVP to make a come-back in the universities.  Wimal said it differently.

‘Galivar nidaagena iddi liliputtan tikak ekathu vela sadda daanava’ (some Lilliputians are making noise while Gulliver is asleep).  

Gulliver, to Wimal, was of course the JVP.   Even back then it was clear that Wimal had a way with words.  In 2010 April, after the UPFA had rolled over all opposition at the General Election, Wimal, addressing a media conference put it succinctly: ‘ratata aadare kattiyata rata giyaa, badata aadare kattiyata bada giyaa’ (‘the country went to those who loved the country, and those who loved their stomachs were inflicted with diarrhea’ playing on the Sinhala word ‘bada’, meaning stomach and therefore the term, literally, ‘stomach went’ or ‘suffered purging’).

Rhetoric was his thing, and not always substance.  A collection of parliamentary speeches titled ‘Garu Kathaanaayakathumani…’ (Honorable Speaker….), another lovely heading by the way, could be described as wordy or alternately ‘fluff’.  Fluff, however, sells.  Wimal was a good salesman.  He was a crowd-puller.  People came to hear him speak.  This is why he was usually asked to make the final speech at major rallies organized by the JVP or by the UPFA when the JVP was the junior partner of that coalition which was led by the SLFP and included several smaller parties such as the CP, LSSP, MEP and DVJP (during the 2004 Parliamentary Election and the 2005 Presidential Election).  This ensured that the crowds would remain until the end.

There’s a story that a parliament reporter related to me way back in 2007 when the final vote on Budget 2008 was taken.  It was a tense moment.  Anura Banadaranaike had crossed over to the Opposition.  It was a given that the TNA and UNP would vote ‘nay’.  Thondaman’s CWC was not ‘in the bag’.  It was a critical moment.  Minister who had just attended a media briefing on cabinet decisions at the Department of Government Information and were sipping tea in the office of the then Director General Anusha Palpita, had grave faces.  Wasantha Ramanayake, who ‘rose’ after Maithripala Siriesna became President but gave the impression of loyalty to the then President, insisted that Parliament should be dissolved.  This was just before the vote was taken.  The JVP held the key.  If the JVP had voted against the budget, it would not pass.

The said reporter said that when the name of the first JVP member of the UPFA was called up, he had looked at Wimal and what was probably a pre-arranged signal had been given.  The JVP abstained.  Had they stood with the Opposition, it could very well have precipitated an unfolding of political events which among other things may have not given us the ‘result’ of May 2009.  Ravi Karunanayake was livid and expressed frustrations by banging on his desk with both hands.  Anura Bandaranaike immediately left the house, hotly followed by Arjuna Ranatunga who was trying to pacify the broken man.

Wimal could be called the signal-giving agent of the JVP for that particular moment, but at the time he was quite the mover and the shaker in the party.  In the very least, he gave the signal that prevented history taking a different turn and taking it instead on a path that might very well have seen the LTTE survive to this date.  On the flip side, of course, it kept the Rajapaksa’s in power and enabled all manner of abuse and erosion of democracy, but that’s another story.   It was a moment that was marked by Wimal Weerawansa.  No contest there.

Wimal was expelled by the JVP in March 2008 and later formed the National Freedom Front (NFF).  That was not a ‘split’.  The real split came when Kumar Gunaratnam and others left to form the Frontline Socialist Party four years later.  If numbers alone counted, then the NFF was an inconsequential sliver and the 2012 split a rip down the middle.  

‘Split’ was what it was called, however.  Perhaps this is why those who supported Sarath Fonseka’s presidential bid in January 2010 thought that Mahinda Rajapaksa could be defeated.  In 2004, the JVP backed Mahinda but in 2010 the party stood with Fonseka.  In 2004, if not for the JVP, Mahinda wouldn’t have had a team to put up posters.  The soldiers, so to speak, had abandoned Mahinda, it was thought.  Other factors should not be discounted of course.  In 2005 Mahinda was a candidate but in 2010 he was incumbent; in 2005 the UNP was a threat, in 2010 it was in disarray; in 2005 Ranil and not Mahinda had the support of both private and public media but in 2010 it was Mahinda who owned the media; in 2005 we were in the middle of a war, by 2010, i.e. under the political stewardship of Mahinda, terrorism had been defeated. Some did say that it was Fonseka who won the war and not Mahinda, but then again those who curse the dictatorial powers of the executive presidency conveniently count out the fact that when dictatorship is conceded sway on all fronts is also implicitly acknowledged. 

What’s relevant here is the error in quantifying the ‘JVP-factor’.  The number of ‘soldiers’ did matter of course, but that factor, when comparing 2005 with 2010 had ceased to be relevant given the changed circumstances and the stature that incumbency gives, not to mention the resources that could be mobilized, legally and illegally.  Outside of this, the JVP was nothing.  Wimal was all.  His voice and turn of phrase, far outweighed anything that the likes of Somawansa, Tilvin, Arura Kumara, Handunnetti, Vijitha Herath and Lalkantha could deliver, individually or as a collective.  

Wimal was one factor and certainly not the only relevant element, but one simply cannot footnote or erase the role he played in the rise of the JVP.   The hard and necessary organizing that is a non-negotiable for party building notwithstanding Wimal gave the JVP the massive public presence it sorely needed following the 88-89 debacle.  He was the JVP’s brand ambassador and helped it rise from a lost cause to a little something and eventually a considerable parliamentary force: 1 seat through Ariya Bulegoa’s party in 1994, 10 in 2000, 17 in 2001 and almost 40 courtesy the manaapa kramaya and joining forces with the SLFP in 2004.  

The brand ambassador became the brand, it could be argued.  Wimal was ejected in 2008 but remained politically relevant.  That’s the advantage of being a brand.  What happened to the JVP after that tells the story of Wimal’s political worth to that party, at least in part. The party’s fortunes declined dramatically.  In April 2010 the JVP won 4 seats (contesting under Fonseka’s banner) and in 2015, returned just 6.  The ‘vote bank’ appears to have stabilized to around 500,000.   

Wimal, along or with his party, is certainly not going to best the JVP in a General Election, but Wimal and his words proved to be a thorn in the JVP’s flesh.  And not just the JVP.   

The maubime panchayudhaya (which he called himself in 2010) has certainly lost its shine.  Electoral defeat does that.  Wrongdoing or even allegations of wrongdoing does that.  There has been a lot of invective against Wimal from pro-Government quarters in social media.  He is not liked.  He is feared by some, especially those who are slow in retort or cannot match his wit.  Others would not consider Wimal a heavyweight.  

One could talk about Wimal’s ideological preferences and how these have evolved over the years.  He’s a nationalist now, for convenience or our of conviction, only he would know.  He is perceived as a threat by those who are opposed to nationalism (are they internationalists, though?).  As such, given the political preferences of the regime, Wimal being incarcerated should be a relief.  It would be a stretch to say that the relief comes from ‘taking out’ a crook, considering the crooks that hobnob with the self-righteous in the high seats of power and the crookedness that is encouraged one way or another by this government.  

Time in the can, as they say, can be sobering.  It quietened Fonseka and all but took out S.B. Dissanayake.  What it would do to Wimal, we cannot say.  He had his moments.  Perhaps he’s not yet done. 

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Jeerers and applauders are also part-players in spectacle-politics

This article was published on July 17, 2010 in the 'Daily Mirror'.   A different time, different players but perhaps it is about a drama that is often played out and not entirely unknown in these theatrical times.

Somewhere in the middle of the year 1987, I was present when a conversation took place between two friends, Kanishka Gunawardena (now the Director of the Programme in Planning, University of Toronto) and Asoka Hewage (presently the Principal, D.S. Senanayake College).  Kanishka and I, quite opposed to the SLFP-led coalition that was in the process of being formulated and of course the fascist tendency of the JVP, were leaning towards the SLMP led by Vijaya Kumaratunga.  Hewage wanted to stick to the so-called ‘meda mawatha’, the ‘Middle Path’ of the SLFP.   

At one point, in exasperation, Hewage interjected, ‘deshapalanaya kiyanne sinamaawak nevei’ (politics is not cinema) to which Kanishka responded, ‘lokaya rangahalak nam deshapalanaya sinamaawak wena eke veradda mokadda?’ (if the world’s a stage then what’s wrong in politics being cinema?).  The reference was to Shakespear’s reflections on the seven stages of a ‘man’.

William Shakespeare, in ‘As You Like It’, divided the average human being’s brief sojourn on earth into seven parts. He tied them all together as a kind of seamless movement from one act to another, role to role and relevant costume-change that comes unannounced and sometimes without the consent or consciousness of the player concerned.  The seven stages are less known than the introductory to their elaboration, ‘All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players; they have their exists and their entrances’.  Few would like to admit that this is what their lives are about, though, i.e. they wear decreed costume and appropriate frills, including body ornament and make-up, that life is an endless process of replacing face with mask, mask with mask and that there comes a point when person and perceiver of person are both unsure what’s face and what’s mask. 

That was more than twenty years ago.  We were at the time merely crawlers in a world that was at the crawling-stage of the Age of Communication.  Spectacle was, we knew, part and parcel of politics, but it was yet to be bathed in spotlights and confetti.  Today, though, it is not part and parcel of politics. It is politics.  It has come to a point where even ‘honesty’ and ‘integrity’ have to come wearing costumes that emit subliminal messages conveying these ‘attributes’.  It has come to a point where nothing short of public self-flagellation can convince anyone of someone’s commitment to cause.  Indeed, I would say that in this age of cynicism, even open wound might not be enough.  Yes, hara-kiri might be the one way to defeat the cynic. 

Politicians can’t blame anyone for this.  They have played the spectacle game for so long (and been very creative about it too, may I add?) that the public has come to accept it as par for course.  J.R. Jayewardene sensed what was to come. This is why immediately after the famous ‘parliament bomb’ incident he attended the cabinet meeting wearing the same (now blood-stained) clothes he was wearing.  It is alleged by some that Chandrika knew beforehand of the 1999 bomb in which she lost an eye and that this was the price for re-election.  Wimal Weerawansa’s naadagama outside the UN premises a few days ago, then, was ‘business as usual’ and quite in order. 

Wimal, more than any other parliamentarian, understands ‘spectacle’. To my mind there are three exceptional communicators in Sri Lankan’s political firmament. Mahinda Rajapaksa is No.1. It comes naturally to him. He never breaks into a sweat.  He delivers punch without script, without cue.  Champika Ranawaka is not gifted this way.  He is no actor.  His edge is a composite of irrefutable logic, an exceptional memory, a commitment to doing the hard yards of reading and the intellect to synthesize.  Wimal was, is and will always be ‘drama’.  His edge is turn of phrase; he has nothing of Rajapaksa’s natural charm or Champika’s sharp, analytical mind. 

He tripped when he barged into the UN premises.  That was a classic error.  People should stick to what they know best. Wimal is made of word, not of agitation.  He tried to scale a wall that was too high for him. He slipped and fell flat on his back.  Yet, let’s give him credit, being consummate politician, he made the best of a bad situation; fall on back, stay there like that and say ‘fast unto death’.  Made perfect political sense.  He is enough of a public figure and has a long enough history for the politically alert to predict the what-is-next of the relevant political script.  Everyone knew that sooner rather than later, Mahinda Rajapaksa would offer a sip of water or thambili and persuade Wimal to end the fast.  That was the one ‘exit’ available after Wimal messed up his ‘entrance’. 

A lot has been said on the incident.  The pundits have thundered that this was the wrong way of dealing with Ban Ki-moon.  They’ve pointed out that Wimal’s theatrics were counter-productive.  I agree.  He was in damage-control mode the moment he ‘fell down’ and to be fair by him, I don’t see if there was any other way he could retreat.  His party claims that the ‘fast’ was an awareness-creating exercise and that it had ‘achieved success’ in terms of galvanizing support for the political position locally.  Perhaps.   There could have been other ways of achieving such goals, but I’ll let that pass. 

I’ve argued elsewhere that unbecoming and ridiculous as Wimal’s ‘entrance’ was, his ideological stand was to my mind without error. I said that I would still stand with him and by him against Ban Ki-moon’s theatrics (yes, that man is also a spectacle-case, a point which very few of Wimal’s detractors are willing to acknowledge or even see).  The man has been lampooned mercilessly and that’s a price that all actors ought to be ready to pay.  Time will tell us who will have the last laugh of course but that’s not my concern. 

When limelight-hugging politicians whisper, it comes out as a roar; one false step and it appears like a major and crippling slip.  That’s one part of the limelight story.  The other part is the limelight-absence does not make audience impotent, without agency or passive recipients of theatre and theatrical.  Those who applaud and those who boo are also part of the overall spectacle.  I remember Gamini Haththotuwegama, widely recognized as the Father of Street Theatre in Sri Lanka, after a performance at the Peradeniya ‘Wala’ (open-air theatre) falling on his knees and worshipping an applauding audience.  It is the audience, friends, that makes stage, births player and scrip-writes the political drama.

I have read all the jeers and much as I am nauseated by political theatre in general and Wimal’s recent antics in particular I found myself asking, ‘what have these jeerers done that gives them the moral right to laugh at Wimal?’  There is an email doing the rounds with pictures of Wimal close to a box of Lemon Puff biscuits, the insinuation being that he was not really fasting.  That’s spurious on the face of it and inconclusive, especially given the intense media coverage and the now taken-for-granted presence of mobile phones.  If Wimal sipped, he would have been media-murdered by the sipping.  I don’t buy it. 

That was a minor laugh, though.  What bothered me was the veritable salivating on the part of some analysts in newspapers.  We all know that people don’t die easily in these fasts-unto-death, for a number of reasons.  Some have howled in protest that Wimal was insincere, and this too is legitimate.  And yet I have wondered if the true source of their discontent is that Wimal did not die.  Would they have rushed to fall on his coffin, weep their hearts out and hailed him as a true patriot and the one sincere politician they’ve encountered in their lifetimes had he in fact perished?  I doubt it. 

To my mind, Wimal’s theatrics were matched, breath to breath, one foodless moment to a corresponding ‘fooded’ moment experienced by the applauders of jeerers.  It is easy to say ‘Wiman dug his grave, let him lie in it’.  That’s an acceptable position to take.  Gamini Gunawardane, retired DIG, in a letter to the Island puts things in perspective when he comments on what two individuals present at the protest had to say. One of them, an elderly person, had said he hadn’t fought in the war and that therefore he came to show solidarity. Another, a woman, she didn’t lose sons to the war, so she had come as a mark of solidarity.  These were individuals who may or may not have seen Wimal as Actor, but recognized the validity of his objection, and in this were implicitly charging Ki-moon of being an actor, a role-player, as much a ‘theatrician’ as anyone else.   Both individuals and Gamini Gunawardane are part of the spectacle, as are those who jeered at Wimal in the newspapers, but they brought a different dimension of ‘light’ to the proceedings.

I got an email from Ramzeen Azeez, a friend.  He, like most people who sympathized with the political objective of the protest, condemned the action and was by no means given to hero-worshipping Wimal.  He put things in context:

‘The fast in in the month of Ramadan (falling around 9th Aug this year) is an obligatory one and one that we expect and (surprisingly to non-Muslims) happily awaited each year. It’s a month of spiritual cleansing. We also observe optional fasts during the rest of the year. This may be either to upgrade piety levels or in fulfilling a vow, calamity, thanksgiving etc.

Optional fasts are more difficult. While the obligatory fast is like income tax (hence easier to undertake) the optional is like giving a donation. The latter is not an imposition - good if you give no problem if you don't. Hence in the case of the optional fast the most difficult moment is when making the INTENTION (we also have a stanza in The Qur'an that echoes Buddha's "chetanahan bhikkhawe kamman wadami" - Kul a'maalin bin-niyya or all actions are judged by their intention. That's why I admire WW's action. The intention to carry out the fast would've been his most trying moment. Those who laughed him off cannot and will never comprehend this aspect.’

Now a man can of course suffer all manner of pain in order to make a point.  Indeed, history is full of self-flagellators who embraced what many would consider ridiculous and even violent causes.  The above, however, ought to sober those who are upset that Wimal didn’t die.  Perhaps they would realize if they meditated a little on these things that jeering is as much spectacle as that which is jeered, that they too are players on a political stage and that they are not more innocent or less culpable than Wimal Weerawansa or anyone else in detracting from the national interest. 

I told Ramzeen that I am disturbed by the venom and that I wondered how these people would write about Wimal’s fast if they themselves (for no reason at all) fasted for 24 hours.  Ramzeen continues: ‘He did it for 52 hours and that's a marathon of a fast! We do it for about 14 hrs for 29 or 30 days.  If one starts fasting at 4.30 am the result is usually a thundering headache around 3pm. The pangs of hunger cringes the stomach linings around 10 am. One can sleep but one cannot sleep away the convulsions of the digestive tract.’ 

And concludes thus: ‘Wimal it seems had a genuine axe to grind with the UN to carry it out and since we know what it was - 3 hearty cheers to Wimal, Hip hip hip..... I've since updated my opinion of the man but still have a few reservations: after all, he's a politician.’  

It was not just Wimal who made an entrance and an exit.  We all enter, we all exit.  We are all applauded or jeered.  This doesn’t mean we cannot or should not pass judgment of course, but perhaps we ought to consider being a little sober about it. 

The last word on theatre and relevant politics is not with William.  It was written earlier, in fact, by Omar Khayyam:

'Tis all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays:
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.

If one does not go overboard with the ‘fate’ element here, there’s a message to all of us.  There is complicity.  There are degrees of complicity.  And complicity can be witnessed and assessed in both applause and jeer.  We are not all saints and neither are we all demons.  Again, nothing wrong in politics being cinematic if the world’s a stage, but there’s something wrong in actor pretending to be audience and therefore conferred with privileged rights to be art critic.  Wimal’s theatrics made me reflect on my stage-strutting.  I wonder if others are or were conscious of their stage-spot. 

Malinda Seneviratne is a freelance writer who can be reached at malindaseneve@gmail.com

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Mahinda Rajapaksa is loved and 'loved'

Those who love him are not concerned about 'comeback' but 'comeback' is a survival 'must' for those who 'love' him

A group of essentially one-man parties have organized a rally.  They’ve invited the 5.8 million who voted for Mahinda Rajapaksa in a losing cause on January 8, 2015 to attend.   They have asked for a show of force. 

Vasudeva Nanayakkara, Dinesh Gunawardena, Wimal Weerawansa and Udaya Gammanpila are all fiery speakers no doubt, but in terms of political endowments such as membership, party machinery and vote-getting ability outside of alignment with a major party, they are impoverished.   Today, with all MPs from the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) pledging support to President Maithripala Sirisena and given their long standing antipathy to the United National Party (UNP), they do not have that political big tree so necessary for them to cling on to if they want to remain politically relevant. 

They clearly need Mahinda Rajapaksa more than Mahinda Rajapaksa needs them.   If one were to assess their chances at a general election contested as a coalition even under the present proportional representation system they would be lucky to get two seats.  Even the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), clinging on to Sarath Fonseka could return only 3 members to Parliament (down from the 40 they had in 2004).  

Ideally, therefore, as far as they are concerned Mahinda Rajapaksa would lead a coalition and help secure enough votes for them to squeeze in.  Those votes would probably come from the SLFP and might end up gifting the bonus seats of relevant districts to the UNP, but it would not help Mahinda’s cause (whatever it may be) at this point.  An all-powerful executive president who becomes a mere Member of Parliament (one out of 225) would look dwarfed.  Why on earth should Mahinda wish such an eventuality on himself?  He, more than anyone else, knows the true weight of an MP.  ‘Lightweight’ would be an exaggeration.

If Mahinda wants to be politically relevant he must remain outside the parliamentary equation.  Today, having recovered a part of a persona that was so crucial in propelling him into the highest political office, the former president is basking in post-election adoration from those who credit him for putting an end to terrorism.  People are going to Medamulana in their hundreds on a daily basis.  This is a phenomenon that we did not see when either Chandrika Kumaratunga or Ranil Wickremesinghe left office.   It would be naïve to count all these as ‘sure votes’ or as evidence of a massive demand for him to enter parliament.  However, should he play a ‘distancing game’ such a demand may grow to a politically relevant magnitude. 

He has made the politically astute move of pledging support to the SLFP and insisting that he will not be part of any moves that cause division in the party.  In short he will not be a spoiler.  He could go further.   He could say for instance that if he has done wrong then let there be a proper investigation and that if found guilty be put behind bars.  He can then add, ‘by the way, since this is all about the primacy of the law, let the principle of equality be applied and all wrongdoing be investigated and all wrongdoers charged in court’.   That would not only make the many wrongdoers currently enjoying high office as well as the favor of the government squirm, it would position him strongly for any future political moves should he be so inclined. 

The only way Mahinda Rajapaksa can remain relevant politically is for him to acknowledge and affirm at every turn that a) Maithripala Sirisena is not only the President of the country he is his (Mahinda’s) president as well, and b) Maithripala Sirisena is not only the leader of the SLFP, he is his (Mahinda’s) leader as well.  He could add that just as he did what his predecessors could not (defeat the LTTE and end the war), his successor is attempting what he himself could not (constitutional reform), observing that both men are SLFP stalwarts.    This would not only help the party but would enhance his stature which (he has to admit) too some severe hits thanks to his own errors.  

Those who love Mahinda, then, should encourage him to remain where he is, which is also where he operates best – on the ground and far away from the cameras. Those who pretend to love him but are only concerned about their political futures would of course want to drag him out of that ‘better zone’ and into a campaign that is scripted to belittle the man. 

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Ven Maduluwawe Sobitha Thera expresses remorse

Wimal Weerawansa, the ardent defender of the regime, staunch nationalist, anti-imperialist and in fact the jaathiye panchaayudaya (self-proclaimed) had come.  He had seen, he had chit-chatted, he had posed for photographs and he had left.  Ven Maduluwawe Sobitha Thera blessed them all with the customary ‘suwapath wethva’ and went into his bedroom.  It had been an animated conversation.  They had talked of the Executive Presidency and other constitutional matters. They had discussed the state of the country.  They had exchanged pleasantries.  The venerable thero was exhausted.  He reclined in an easy chair and reflected.  He thought.

‘What was that all about?  Why on earth did I agree to meet Wimal?  What was I trying to achieve?  What was his objective?

‘I met him in my capacity as the Convener of the Movement for a Just Society, this is true, but to what end?  Wimal is Wimal.  A good orator.  An excellent communicator.   He knows all about brands, brand building and brand positioning.  I was in the photographs that made it to the newspapers.  So what?  I am not the one getting the political mileage.  I am not the one who is getting brand exposure.

‘I should have known better.  After all I know Wimal.  I know his history. I know of his hunger-strike.  I know the threats and withdrawal of threats.  After each feigned disagreement with the President, Wimal comes out strong defending the regime.  The last line of every episode has been the same.  He says that he will not allow the regime to be defeated.  Aanduwa wattanna denne nehe. 

‘Maybe I am getting old.  If I had any doubts, all the hue and cry about Cyril Ramaphosa’s visit should have laid them to rest.  One would have thought that Wimal would have suffered a coronary if Ramaphosa ever came.  Well, he has come now.  Wimal has not announced a hunger strike. He has not even done a Palitha Thevarapperuma, threatening to resign knowing well that Mahinda would bail him out at the last moment.  Someone said that Ramaphosa was but a tourist and that seems to have been enough for Wimal.

‘Wimal has words.  Had he been in the opposition he would have creamed whoever said that Ramaphosa was a tourist.  Actually I wish there was someone like Wimal in the opposition.  They just have voice-cut politicians.  Sloth is their middle name.  Now Wimal, had he been in the opposition, would have asked the Government if the TNA was a bunch of wild elephants roaming around in Wilpattu. He would have asked the Government if the TNA’s offices was some culturally and historically significant archaeological site.  He would have asked why Ramaphosa has not included Sigiriya, Dambulla and Kandy in his itinerary.  He didn’t do that. He remained silent.

‘So what was this visit all about?  Wimal doesn’t want regime-change. He does not want Mahinda ousted.  He is not interested in a just society because he doesn’t have the eyes to see all the injustice happening around him and even if he did his biting wit does not bend this way and that to twist a phrase and deliver scathing criticism. 

‘This was not a visit to pay respects. It was not to obtain blessings.  Maybe I should just treat it all with equanimity.  I was tricked, this is true.  But I cannot, as a bikkhu, turn away anyone, even Wimal.  And in any case, I have spent hours and hours with people as dodgy as Wimal or worse.  Yes, that’s it.  I will take that line.  It’s all I can salvage after being turned into a pawn in one of Wimal’s many publicity chess games.’

*All this in a parallel universe, of course. 

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If 19 is to equal 13 +...

According to National Freedom Front (NFF) leader Wimal Weerawansa a petition to get the 13^th Amendment abrogated was held back considering the current tensions between the Judiciary and Legislature.  Talks with the UNP and SLFP suggest that there are few takers for dogmatic positions on the 13^th Amendment.  Even the leader of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), R. Sampanthan, while holding fast to ‘devolution’, has expressed a willingness to go for re-demarcation of unit, i.e. three or four zones instead of the present nine provinces. 

Sampanthan has warned that repealing the 13^th ‘could cause grave and irreparable damage to the country’s future’.   It is heartening that the TNA leader, even at this late hour, is concerned about the country’s future.   Indeed his re-demarcation proposal amounts to a radical political shift from the previous fascination with white-lines or those provincial boundaries based on a map drawn by colonial rulers.   A re-demarcation, though, would necessarily amount to ‘modification’ and/or ‘nullification’ of the 13^th, an eventuality that Sampanthan opposes.  It is best that these ‘concerns’ are treated as the business-as-usual rhetorical of a politician and something that should not be allowed to rob the ‘statesman-like’ suggestion that the TNA leader has made in his interventions during the Budget Debate.

Sampanthan is of course erroneous when he says ‘the 13^th is the only constitutional provision that recognizes diversity’.  All it does is legitimate the work of a frivolous map-maker later used by Eelamist myth-mongers for their own purposes.  Communities are not held by maps, and fall out of provincial boundary.  The recognition of difference, as in the existence of different communities and people with different religious faiths, finds more than adequate mention in the constitution.  The only major differentiation that the constitution is silent on is that of class. 

Still, Sampanthan does make a valid point about efficiency in resource allocation.  The 13^th has seen enormous sums of money going waste, mostly to maintain the provincial councils rather than alleviating the conditions of the citizenry.  Moreover, the current lines rebel against contemporary economic thinking given anomalies of resource endowment across regions.  A re-demarcation then must correct for these inequalities.  In other words, logic and science as opposed to political expediency and untenable ethnic ‘enclaving’ should guide the cartographer.   It would logically take us to Ruhunu, Maya and Pihiti, an option which even in these communal politicking times should be considered.  

What would result is ‘horizontal democratization’ as some have put it, provided of course that the devolved complement of powers exceed what is contained in the 13^th.  Provided, also, that the power of the citizen to participate in decision-making is enhanced in the process.  For example, devolving the power to exercise strong-arm tactics and be dismissive of manifesto post-election from center to province won’t make things easier for anyone but the politicians. 

The trick then would be to follow such re-demarcation as per a 13+ formula with vertical democratization which includes measure to correct current institutional flaws, ensure greater transparency and obtain greater degrees of accountability.  Ideally, the two processes, vertical and horizontal, can be sought through a single amendment or better still a new, that is a third, republican constitution, but this may not be the proper time. Insistence on a double-push might kill both. 

As of now, justice for all in the matter of having a meaningful say in designing laws and policies that affect people’s lives depend more on largesse than on constitutional provision.  That’s not a flaw in the 13^th Amendment but the 1978 Constitution. 

So if we have to go with ‘first-things-first’, then 13+ must necessarily pick up the Sampanthan proposal.  To make it really a ‘plus’ amendment, though, the vertical ‘re-demarcation’ if you will of power lines has to be pushed for.  

 

 

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